Rhossili

Rhossili is a small village and community on the southwestern tip of the Gower Peninsula in Swansea. It is within an area designated as the first Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty in the United Kingdom. The village has a community council and is part of the Gower parliamentary constituency, and the Gower electoral ward.Origin of nameRhossili probably gets its name in part from the Welsh word for moorland, rhos. The second element in the name may be a reference to a Saint Sulien or St. Sili, but details are not clear. Certainly the present Norman church is dedicated to St. Mary the Virgin. Inside there is a memorial to Edgar Evans who was the first to perish on the Terra Nova Expedition on the return from the South Pole.HistoryThere was a local tradition that there had been an earlier, pre medieval village complete with church closer to the sea which had been abandoned after "besanding" in the 14th century. A storm and subsequent excavation of newly exposed remains in the Warren (an area of sand dunes to the north of the present village) in 1980 helped to confirm the truth of this.